Seminario IPP: "The Causal Effect of Unemployment on Distributive Preferences"

Abstract: “We used behavioral experiments to generate incentive compatible measures of individuals’ tendencies to acknowledge earned entitlement. We incorporated these experiments into a novel two-stage study. In the first stage, participants’ acknowledgement of earned entitlement was measured by engaging them in the behavioral experiments and their individual employment status and other relevant socioeconomic characteristics were recorded. In the second stage, a year later, the process was repeated using the same instruments. Specifically, we investigate whether losing a job causes individuals to acknowledge earned entitlement less. Then, to investigate the generalizability of our findings, following the same procedure, we test whether leaving full-time education and becoming unemployed has a similar effect. We show that becoming unemployed erodes the extent to which a person acknowledges earned entitlement.”